


And We Shall Never Be Again

by jdphoenix



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Post-Thor: The Dark World
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-01
Updated: 2014-05-01
Packaged: 2018-01-21 13:25:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1552049
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is not a deadly wound and he certainly deserves far worse, so she does not see why it sets her teeth on edge and makes her heart long for battle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And We Shall Never Be Again

"If I loved you less, I might be able to talk about it more."  
-  _Emma_ , Jane Austen

 

The good thing about trolls - the _only_ good thing when she thinks on it - is that they lumber. They are physically incapable of taking a single step without knocking into a tree or shaking the earth beneath their heavy feet. It makes hiding from them a great deal easier.

It grates at her not to be able to fight them off but they are the both of them injured and deep in enemy territory besides.

Rocks slide down the mountainside courtesy of their lead-footed pursuers. Sif darts ahead, careful to keep close to the wall of stone to her left. A figure shadows her movements, following the curves of the boulders to her right. The last stone hits the earth and his arm flies out at the same moment, signaling her to stop. She does so on instinct honed by centuries of fighting alongside him. The ease with which they work together now has her blood boiling.

He looks to the cliffs above her and she can count the enemy in every wrinkle of his forehead and twitch of his jaw. When he finally looks to her she gestures, one of many signs known only to the members of their once-merry band. He touches the pale stone at his back and his shadow springs to life. It travels along the ground like a snake over sand. It is not unlike its master in that way.

Loki can see the thought on her face and smirks in response as if it were a joke she invited him to join in. She scowls and his smile only grows. It benefits her in the end. His smile grows too wide and his muscles pull at the cut running from his temple to jaw. The half-dried blood flows anew.

It is not a deadly wound - not unless there was poison on the blade and trolls are rarely so cunning - and he certainly deserves far worse, so she does not see why it sets her teeth on edge and makes her heart long for battle.

The shadow returns before she can think overlong on it. As the next round of pounding footsteps sounds, Loki leads the way.

She would never have found the crack in the wall without him. It is hidden so completely behind a boulder that she almost cannot fit through in her armor. The crack opens into a bigger cavern and she bursts into it like a cork from a bottle. She digs the tip of her sword into the ground to keep her footing.

He comes in more easily and steps lightly around her despite the darkness. She can feel him pass and the scent of him makes her think of ancient tomes.

“Light,” she croaks, her throat hoarse from the chase and the dust of this pale world.

He summons a globe of magical light readily and lets it float up until it nearly touches the low ceiling. There is little room in the cavern. She can touch both walls without fully extending her arms but the shadows further in are deep.

“It goes farther,” he says as he sinks to the floor.

“How far?” she asks, resolutely keeping to her feet.

“I don’t know,” he says crossly. “I only looked to find somewhere large enough to hide us both.”

“Then we go on. This is no time for rest.” If this cavern can lead them through the mountain, to somewhere isolated where she can send a message to Heimdall in safety then they may well be done with this madness before the day is through.

“This is the exact time for rest!” he snaps. He twists to face her and his hair falls into his wound. He hisses in pain and turns away. Over her head, the intensity of the light wavers.

Perhaps it _is_ the time for rest. They have been constantly either fighting or running ever since the sun rose. First, when he was exposed as the pretender and usurper he is and then from the trolls whose home he and she found themselves in when she followed him through a crack in the world.

It was not a wise plan, she knows, but it was no plan at all really. She could not let him escape. It was simple as that.

He hisses in pain once more and she rolls her eyes. Odin help her. He is as stubborn as Thor when he wants to be.

“Let me,” she says. Never one to balk at silly little things like personal space, she grabs his chin and tilts his face towards the light.

“ ** _Don’t touch me!_** ” he roars, his voice black as his heart no doubt is. She allows him to bat her hand away. He turns from her, curling in on himself. The fabric of his cloak pulls tight over his back, showing every line of the clothing beneath.

She rubs her thumb over the pads of her fingers. She brushed the edge of the wound and might think his reaction natural - that of a wounded animal defending itself - _might_ , if not for the frost clinging to her fingertips.

She eases to the ground, her eyes never leaving the curve of his spine.

“Will that hold it?” she asks.

He wants to look at her, nearly does so, but does not dare turn his face so she can see the ice mending his wound. Instead he carefully turns himself until he can sit comfortably against the wall opposite her with his injured side completely in shadow.

“Who?” he asks once he is settled.

She sighs. “What does it matter, Loki?”

“ _Who told you?_ ” he demands.

“Did you kill the Allfather?” she asks in return.

He turns away in disgust.

“Is he dead?” she presses. It is not the same question, not nearly, but she knows from experience to take what answers she can get with him.

“Do you worry, Sif?”

“For Asgard. Always,” is her ready reply.

He laughs. This is not the laughter she has known for centuries but some other sound that is nothing like laughter at all. “Oh no. I think this time it is all for you. If Odin is dead and Thor has refused the throne, then _I_ am the rightful king and your little stunt on the bridge this morning was - what’s the word? Oh, that’s right - _treason_.”

She wants nothing more than to deny that the thought ever crossed her mind - except it did, a dozen times or more.

“My oath is to Asgard,” she says.

“And I am her king!”

Her heart stills in her chest and she feels her face slacken. The glee vanishes from his expression and he turns once more, putting nearly all of his face into shadow so that all she can see is a spot of light reflecting off his eye.

At length he says, “Even _if_ Odin is alive, he is not present in Asgard. He is not able to govern her people.”

It is not an answer but she knows it is as close as she will get. She owes him nothing for it and, if she thinks on it, he owes her far more than she could ever owe him, but still she answers him.

“No one.”

He forgets himself and turns to face her wholly. She cannot stop her eyes from tracing the path of the axe that nearly rent him in two. The moment it fell, when blood spilled upon the floor and she could not clearly see how deeply it had gone, she felt as though her lungs were filled with lead.

He tries to turn away again but she lunges across the small distance and takes his head in her hands. He stills beneath her touch and she is careful to keep her grip light but firm. She will not make him more uncomfortable than necessary but she will not alter her design for him either.

He watches her with unreserved loathing as she moves a hand to his chin so that, with the other, she can inspect his work. She does not touch the ice but lets her fingers hover over it. His jaw tightens under her grip and she feels his throat working against her knuckles. The air around the wound is cool, a breath of winter amid the summer heat.

Her eyes are anywhere but on his. She is a warrior and as such is more aware of her body than a common man or woman might be. She is not surprised to find she is straddling him, her knees digging into the dirt on either side of his thighs so that all she would have to do is to relax her stance and she would be upon him. What catches her off guard is how much all of this - the closeness, the looking down into his face, the cold beneath her fingers - reminds her of another day.

“No one told me,” she says.

The shadows grow sharper around them.

“You just knew?” he asks, his voice dripping with disdain. “It’s a wonder you never mentioned it to me yourself. You could have saved me a great deal of shock.”

Her grip on him tightens a hair and her nails scrape his skin. She pushes through the weight of long ago memories and leans closer until neither of them can see anything but the other.

“I am no fool but neither am I clairvoyant. After you fell -” _Odin_ , she hates the way her voice drops- “there were things said. Little bits and pieces, the sorts of things you would have enjoyed piecing together.”

“And that was all it took? A few veiled references to my heritage and suddenly you realized what not even I knew?”

She does not mention that she eavesdropped on the king and queen, that Frigga related his words - _a son of Odin_ \- to the Allfather as if they bore the weight of all the worlds.

“It was not just words,” she says instead. She allows herself to relax only slightly. She can feel him stirring beneath her. His face is all rage and malice and perhaps that helps him as it does her but she thinks it is more familiarity. “I never thought on it overmuch. You were always the odd one and a sorcerer at that. How was I to know the chill you gave was a sign of something else? And then we stood on Jotunheim and I felt true winter - but not for the first time.”

She eases her weight onto her heels to stand but his hands are at her back, holding her where she is.

“I chilled you?” he asks with a twist to his lips.

She smiles at the memory of it. He did not leave her cold, that much is certain, but there were moments when his breath upon her over-warm skin was like ice and when he spilled himself inside of her…

It was long ago now and the distance made longer still by his deeds of late. She wants nothing more than to peel the clothes from his body and ensure herself he is still whole but then, she thinks, what she truly wants is a return to those long ago days.

She pushes through his hold on her and he lets his hands fall away. There is no going back, he has made certain of that.

“It is time to press on,” she says firmly.

Whatever he feels is quickly masked by a look of distant humor as if this has all been some game to pass the time. She does not miss the way he angles himself away from her, pressing into the wall even as he tries to stand so that he will not touch her in the close space.

She offers him her hand. He stares at it a beat before lifting his. She holds him firmly as he rises and keeps her grip a moment too long.


End file.
